Boys Will Be
by Suki
Summary: We all have our limits.  And Kagome has met several of them.  No matter how endearing, chivalrous, smooth, or gorgeous they may be.


_Disclaimer: _Inuyasha_ and Co. are © their respective owners. I just borrow them on the weekends._

_Summary__: We all have our limits. And Kagome has met several of them. No matter how endearing, chivalrous, smooth, or gorgeous they may be. _

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_**Boys Will Be**_

**By Suki**

Kagome had had enough.

It was like every time they started to make progress they snagged on some obstacle taking the form of a masculine warrior-demon with a huge weapon. It was like Inuyasha had to stick around to prove that his weapon was _bigger_ and _better_ and _faster_ and _stronger_ even if it took a whole day and all her arrows. It was like he couldn't just _get on with it_ then without throwing in a lot of snippy, insolent insults to the potential (objectified) threat. And then they would proceed into an absurd ritual of blasts, explosions, slices, and punches which had become, at some early infancy of sentient beings, a standardized practice and exemplification of manhood.

Why the heck anyone thought men were a good idea, Kagome could never guess. Women, being more efficient, got so much more done between enemies (for example, one need only observe the damaging rumors hurry-rushing down the reservoir-like communication lines of teenage schoolgirls).

And now, in the midst of one of their testosterone-driven skirmishes, Kagome did what any other sane-minded, strong-willed, fed-up female would have done.

She sat down in the middle of the grass and burst into tears.

"What the hell?" Inuyasha, half-surprised, half-annoyed, paused his dignified display of throwing taunts and waving around his _Tetsaiga_ like a baton to glare at her. Fortunately, the momentary distraction didn't bereave him of his responsive senses, and he successively dodged a typical blow from Sesshoumaru and doubled backwards at a safe distance, glaring down his elder brother haughtily.

"What did you do _now_?" Kouga snapped, glaring as insolently as he could manage in Inuyasha's direction.

"Me? I didn't do anything!" he retorted, and the small vein above his left eyebrow began to pulse irregularly.

From the frayed edges of the forest, at a sufficient yet comfortable observing distance, Kikyo shifted gracefully.

Sesshoumaru was not amused. From his place at the opposite end of the green-speckled glade, he tried desperately to refocus their attention. Unfortunately, no one ever told him that steely, silent glares are paling in competition with the wails of a woman.

"Lady Kagome, are you ill?" the monk – popping from the behind-the-battle-scene where he usually lurked during such scuffles, arriving out of thin air in time of need as he did now – jangled his staff, kneeling in concern.

Kagome fiercely shook away his (suspect) hands and sobbed louder.

"Get _away_." It was an exasperated Sango, shooing Miroku like a child sneaking dinner.

Sesshoumaru was getting jealous.

Kikyo alerted her hearing, intrigue pricking her like a needle.

Sesshoumaru, more for attention than an attempt at accuracy, slashed his inherited weapon at Inuyasha, who was once again forced to focus on his brother.

A lovely backdrop fashioned itself out of two dog-demons, weapons crossed and condensed in power, tensing so hard they barely twitched; Kikyo scowling-without-actually-frowning; Shippou and Kirara peeping out from behind a friendly rock; Kouga getting angry; Miroku looking bewildered; and Sango patting Kagome sympathetically, then peering accusingly at the men in her vicinity.

"Will you all just . . . _grow up_ for five minutes?" Sango scolded.

Inuyasha jumped back, skillfully diverting the excess power from his brother's sword and dissipating it harmfully into the dusky air. He huffed and shifted the weight of his weapon but kept his guard.

He and Kouga's eyes met each other knowingly. This was obviously some kind of conspiracy.

Miroku, who was more peaceful by nature, raised his eyebrows.

Sango, still scowling, helped a sniffling Kagome to her feet, who rubbed a balled fist into one eye childishly.

"I want to go home," she muttered.

Inuyasha opened his mouth but had to dodge another smattering of punches from his less-than-enthusiastic brother. He shouted, amid a staccato of minor explosions, "And you couldn't have thought of a better time to bring this up?"

"Jerk!" Kagome parried eloquently.

Kouga appeared on cue. "I'll look after you, Kagome, I promise . . .."

A smile dawned hesitantly on her lips.

" . . . after I take care of this." His wolfish, slanted eyes glanced lustily in the direction of battle, where Sesshoumaru was now threatening a poisoned claw at his young half-brother.

And the smile died an early death.

"Now – now, don't do that!" Kouga pleaded, after Kagome's tears resumed.

"Don't do this! Don't do that!" Kagome balled her fists and held them taut at her sides. "If you all would take your own advice –! I'm sick of this! The only thing missing from here is Bankotsu and his enormous halberd! Why don't we just invite Naraku while we're at it?"

Okay, so it was cute sometimes. They way they all ran around spunkily and the way their eyes lit up like little boys playing with sparklers whenever they smelled a challenge. But at times like this, with her back aching, and her head pulsing, and the ghost of her bed haunting her with teases of plush pillows and a cozy comforter, she felt that there was just no way for her to plug into this iron (albeit treacherous) network of male bonding.

It was thoroughly sentineled from any wandering shreds of common sense.

As if to demonstrate, the _youkai_ brothers sent a resounding clang through the glade and larger valley with their swords.

Kagome, suddenly grown somber, turned abruptly to the _taiji-ya_ and said, "Sango. I'm going home."

Sango, face serene, eyes closed in understanding, nodded her agreement.

Kouga quirked his head at them in a question, but before he could speak, a thoroughly confused and irked _hanyou_ threw all his weight and power into knocking Sesshoumaru a good nine yards away (Sesshoumaru, for his part, landed lightly on his feet despite a mild bout of disorientation) and yelled, "Whad'ya mean you're _going home_!"

But Kagome was resolved. "Just do . . . whatever it is you're doing . . . and _at least_ allow me to get some rest in the meantime." She blatantly gestured by drawing the glade in, making a crescent with her arm.

"Trust me, Inuyasha," she added, not unkindly, "you'll be fine, and I know that it'll be like I never even left and we can pick up where we left off the moment I return." (A knowing glance in the direction of Sesshoumaru.)

From her shadowy perch, Kikyo leaned forward slightly.

"That – what?" Inuyasha seemed at a lost. He gave a vacant look in his brother's direction, but the demon lord waited, crossed arms resting in a thinly disguised veil of patience, and was of no help.

"Lady Kagome," Miroku offered in his smooth persuasiveness, "it's not at all safe for you to go away, unescorted."

Kagome shot him a look reminiscent of an anvil cracking his head open. "You can't be _serious_, Miroku. You do _realize_ that all possible threats in the entire _Sengoku Jidai_ are bottlenosed into the three-hundred square footage of this mountain glade?"

But before he could answer – or ask what a bottle was, precisely, and what the significance of its nose could mean – Sango stepped forward, long hair swaying, and stated:

"I'll go with her."

The affirmation ignited a sudden panic in the demons canine, who both darted to her side like arrows, effectively keeping her from turning to leave.

"Stop it!" She squirmed just as deftly from out of the sandwiching pair and faced them. Her eyes gleamed from their recent tear-bath. "I will _follow_ you around, and _cheer_ you on, and patiently wait out the meandering developments of our battles here another day. I know it's my responsibility, and yes, I know I'm the _shikon no miko_." She sighed. "Right now I'm just too tired." And, she added silently, it was most undoubtedly that time of the month again.

Sesshoumaru sneered and snorted.

Shippou, taking advantage of the lull in battle, jumped out from behind his rock and alighted onto Kagome's shoulder.

She looked at Inuyasha tenderly; and for Kouga, who was closer, she took his hand and patted it. (This elicited no small bristling from Inuyasha.)

Then she shouldered her pack, nodded to Sango, and, adjusting Shippou, lifted her palms up to the sky.

" . . . Proceed."

There was an eighth of a second accosted with guttural throat-sounds, signifying the roots of a unanimous objection by three males, but alas – they were never to be uttered.

Because at that moment, a swift swish and a smear of bright berry color at the _miko_'s side signified Kikyo's interjection – and subsequent startling alliance.

"I agree," she said, taking Kagome's arm, smooth as soil. "I grow tired of all these clamorings."

And the two priestesses moved away arm in arm, as tight as twins, exasperation uniting them. Sango blinked, looked the gentlemen over one by one, then shook her head, and followed after them.

Miroko, Kouga, and Inuyasha, thoroughly and genuinely ravaged with bewilderment, stood around silently for many seconds, awkwardly kicking the dirt and frowning into evening air. None seemed quite able to articulate himself.

Inuyasha, temper as rapidly ignited as gunpowder by flame, swerved around indignantly, facing his back to the retreating women, and crossed his arms about his chest. "Stupid woman. Doesn't she know that what we do, whether or not it looks like a bunch of swinging swords to her, is of the utmost importance?" He glanced up, black brows furrowed.

And started.

Shook his white mane of hair about the glen incredulously. "What the - ?"

When Miroku and Kouga looked, they realized that Sesshoumaru, resigned to rejection (or boredom, one of the two) had long since left, departed to pursue other goals needing his immediate attention (or which offered him theirs, one of the two).

Who ever said Lord Sesshoumaru of the Western Lands was vain?

Inuyasha sunk into the grass, his sword diminishing to the broken bone with a jagged edge.

Kagome, for her part, was rather pleased, and although the presence of the dead priestess would in other circumstances have left her uneasy, she walked along in the shadowed woods, dusk creeping in under the branches, and hummed to herself.

Enmity could wait. And good riddance!

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_AN__: I was re-watching the episode where Bankotsu goes to the castle to retrieve his "companion" Banryuu and wondered at the silly endearing-ness of boys and their swords. Following his almost juvenile and delightful dialogue about fighting and killing people and watched the taunting battle that followed, I wondered if Kagome ever got tired of the hit-and-kill approach to solving conflicts. Thus, this fic was born. S_


End file.
